“The Pope proposes replacing the abstract ideal of peace with concrete action.” Starting from this insight of Pope Leo XIV, Giovanni Scarafile, professor of moral philosophy at the University of Pisa, comments on the Pope’s address to Italian bishops on 17 June, wherein the Holy Father refers to peace as an “ecclesial dimension”, not just a political requirement or spiritual aspiration. According to Scarafile, peace thus emerges as an ethos arising from liturgical, catechetical, and charitable life, grounded in the ecclesiology of communion.
(Foto giovanniscarafile.me)
Is nonviolence education a utopian dream in our societies marked by conflict and polarisation?
The times we live in call for the urgent reinstatement of nonviolence education. Many Catholic and secular figures who embodied this principle risk being forgotten: from Don Lorenzo Milani to Danilo Dolci, from Aldo Capitini to Father Ernesto Balduzzi, who showed with Gospel and social rigour that nonviolence is not an escape from reality, but a radical way of engaging with it. At the ecclesial level, this means creating spaces for reconciliation in parishes and wounded territories; at the educational level, training teachers able to inhabit conflict without oversimplifying it; at the community level, promoting intergenerational and intercultural workshops where dialogue is a concrete way of life.
In what way is nonviolence a concrete art of peaceful coexistence?
It is vital to demonstrate that nonviolence is not an abstraction, but a concrete art of living together, an act of empowerment engaging each person according to their possibilities – not only intellectuals or specialists, but every believer called to choose daily words and gestures capable of defusing hostility and safeguarding encounter.
Associate Professor of Moral Philosophy at the University of Pisa and Liu Boming Professor at Nanjing University (NJU). He is the series editor of “Controversies: Ethics and Interdisciplinarity” (John Benjamins Publishing Company, Amsterdam) and of “Etiche applicate e antropologie filosofiche” (Milella). He is Vice President of the International Association for the Study of Controversies (IASC). His most recent book is “La spina nella carne. Cinque lezioni sul dialogo” (YOD Institute, 2025).
The Pope interprets the verse “If possible, on your part, live at peace with all” as a concrete responsibility. What kind of anthropology underpins this interpretation?
This verse, read by Pope Leo XIV as an invitation to concrete responsibility, resonates deeply with the notion of unheardalgia that I have recently explored: that existential pain born of not being heard, of a systematic absence of recognition in relationships.
Peace necessarily requires the capacity to listen, since the invisibility of the other generates conflict as much as explicit action.
What are the deepest roots of this relational fragility?
Unheardalgia reveals that violence can arise from seemingly harmless omissions: not listening, not recognising, remaining indifferent. It thus becomes urgent to recover a relational and intersubjective anthropology, far removed from individualistic or functionalist models, in which the person exists authentically only in reciprocal relationship with the other. The Pope’s call to peace is a precise ethical call: to recognise the wounds of unheardalgia and respond with daily practices of authentic listening and relational attention.
How can fear of the other be transformed into an opportunity for genuine encounter?
Transforming fear of the other into opportunity, as proposed by Pope Leo XIV, is not a matter of emotional spontaneity or ethical improvisation.
It requires genuine mediation, which cannot be left to chance or impersonal mechanisms, because it involves personal exposure, facing the effort and risk of encounter.
All meaningful mediation passes through personal conscience, not as a private refuge but as the capacity to discern and decide freely.
On 17 June, during his audience with the Italian Episcopal Conference, Pope Leo XIV renewed the Church’s commitment to peace, calling for every diocese to become “a house of peace”. “Peace is not a spiritual utopia,” he said, “but a humble path, made up of daily gestures, weaving together patience and courage, listening and action.” The Pontiff called for education in nonviolence, mediation in local conflicts, and projects of welcome capable of transforming “fear of the other into an opportunity for encounter”.
What risks do you see in our understanding of leadership?
People are often attracted to charismatic or strong figures, but it is necessary to guard against egocentric tendencies that turn leadership into domination. We need an education of conscience that liberates relationships from conformism and makes them authentic spaces of care and truth.
The Pope described peace as a “humble path” made up of “daily gestures”. What does this imply for communication?
Embracing peace as a “humble path” today requires advanced communication skills. If we remain satisfied with a repetitive and predictable media ethics – like someone consulting a faded map where the roads exist but no longer indicate where to go – today it is necessary to decisively adopt dialogetics, an ethical approach to communication imbued with anthropological vision.
What do you mean by “dialogetics”?
Traditional media ethics are inadequate for contemporary challenges; their codes, conceived for twentieth-century print media, are powerless in the face of algorithms and artificial virality.
Dialogetics instead integrates phenomenology and communication pragmatics. Where traditional ethics asks “Is this true?”, dialogetics asks “How does this truth transform its recipients and the networks through which it flows?”.
The difference is profound: on one side abstract rules; on the other, communication as a living relational event, involving body, speech, responsibility, and the capacity to generate meaning.
How can this vision be translated into ecclesial life in practical terms?
It would be desirable for every diocese to establish stable formation spaces dedicated to dialogetics, understood as the serious and continuous exercise of responsible speech, respectful dialogue, and shared meaning-making. Even small workshops, if well-rooted, can generate lasting change in the quality of ecclesial and civil discourse.
